That’s today’s question on Park Slope Parents. It gave me a chuckle. Maybe someone should franchise PS and open “Park Slope style” communities all over the country.

I guess Park Slope is short-hand for a certain type of place. I bet you could have a lively conversation about what kind of place that is. Or not.

They probably want the good:

A sense of community, kid-friendly, park, nice architectural scale with brownstones and tree-lined streets, a reverence for historical preservation, progressive politics, independent bookstore, a food coop…

And not the bad:

Overpriced, bad parking, too many strollers on the sidewalks, not enough schools, lack of diversity, etc. (there’s a whole article coming out in New York Magazine about why people hate Park Slope…).

So what’s the Park Slope brand that everyone is looking for in Denver and Boston? And where in Denver can you find it?

And would you want to? I mean Denver has it’s own personality. Wouldn’t you want that, too?

Ready for my close up, I arrived at the CUNY Television studio at 7:15 and sat in the Green Room with Steven Berlin Johnson and John Geraci until they went in to do their interview.

Eating fruit salad and sipping Diet Pepsi, I watched as Steven and John talked about place blogging and what Outside.in is all about.

Steven is so ready for prime time.

They showed their buzz maps, which traces the location of hot stories and the ratio of bloggers to traditional media coverage. When Brian asked why Brooklyn is so bloggy Steven said: gentrification.

What’s the bloggiest nabe? he asked. Clinton Hill, of course.

Then it was my turn. "The dentist will see you now," the producer said. It all went by in a blur. I know Brian asked who reads my blog. He asked about Hugh’s pictures and said something like,

"Crawford, eh? Do I detect nepotism?"

I talked about the kind of stories I like to do. He asked about the blogfest. And that was about it. Oh yeah, Brian read Leon’s poem

DEM PREZ TICK

Winning combo,

Cream of the crop;

Newbie below,

Woman on top.

I told him about Leon. "I call him the oh-so-prolific-one He sends me poems every day. I’ve never met him…"

Luckily Leon was watching the show:

You actually pronounced my name correctly.  My mom never mastered it, to my father’s chagrin.  You can be sure she’ll bake you a fruit cake for Hanukkah.

You started off shakily–who wouldn’t?–but just two minutes into it, you sounded like  a seasoned pro, on a par with Brian Lehrer.

I’m sure your blogfest along with OTBKB will benefit from your upbeat performance.

In case your Inquiring Photographer forgot, I taped the broadcast and it’s instantly available to you; I live on Eighth Ave/Fiske Place, probably minutes away from you.

Mom says you look like Anna Magnani, only more passionate.

Racked had this story yesterday: The grand opening is March 13th of the first Brooklyn Urban Outfitters. I happen to love the store.

It’s where Teen Spirit buys his jeans. I was just in the 72nd Street branch yesterday and bought a belt, Jukebox, the new Cat Power CD, and 2 pairs of skinny jeans. For him.

Says Racked: “A week from now Atlantic Avenue will be irrevocably changed.”

They got that right. The avenue of antique stores selling oak barrister shelves and Victorian fainting couches is now tres chic. Sort of.

It ain’t like it used to be.

Remember when all the Brooklyn teen bands played at Liberty Heights Tap Room in Red Hook?

Well, Steve Deptula, former owner of Liberty Heights Tap Room and guardian angel to Brooklyn teen rockdom,  sold the bar to Rocky Sullivan’s (he still owns the building) and he’s producing The Young + Wrestless, an all-ages music series, at Southpaw now.

I’m not sure how often he’s doing the shows there, but there’s one coming up with on Saturday March 15th starting at 2 p.m. with Play, Jet Lag, Dulaney Banks and the Mighty Handful.

Here are the ‘tails:
125 Fifth Ave. Brooklyn, NY 11217
Phone:
718.230.0236

Play 2:00pm   35 minute set.
Jet Lag 2:45pm 35 minute set
Dulaney Banks 3:30pm 35 minute set
The Mighty Handful 4:15pm 35 minute s

So now that the red chair is in its temporary position in the dining room next to the doorway to the kitchen, I keep bumping into it.

To put it succinctly: It’s in the way.

But it does make a great place to dump coats, backpacks, electric guitars and cereal bowls (with the Raisin Bran caked on – gross).

How long will it stay there I wonder. Mrs. Kravitz hasn’t asked about it in days. Maybe on the weekend. I showed it to my lovely neighbor. She may come back.

Someone wrote in to say:

“I think you should keep the chair. Things like that linger with kids. Eventually they will go to college and THEN you can get rid of the chair.”

Spoken from the heart of someone who obviously had something important taken away from them when they were a child. Truthfully, I think everyone is enjoying the more spacious living room. Although Teen Spirit pointed angrily at the Eames plastic chair I put in the red chair’s place and said,

“You don’t expect us to sit on THAT do you?”

I remember when we moved out of our Fifth Street apartment and moved here. Teen Spirit was so upset even though this apartment was an obvious improvement (to us, anyway). He missed the old place so much. He was only three. He got over that when a nice boy named Eddie moved into the apartment downstairs. Then he loved it on Third Street forevermore.

So kids adjust. They really do.

Still, the red chair bump into me, stubs my toe, looks longingly my way overflowing with leather jackets, books and other detritus of life in the apartment.

What will become of me? it seems to say. What will become of me?

The Mark Ravitz sculpture inside the storefront where Park Slope Books used to be is really cool.

It’s sort of a standing anthropomorphic version of one of Ravitz’s drips. Think sun/octopus creature with a cyclops-like eye.

The artist has posed a light on the sculpture, which makes it easy to see around the clock and gives the space of very dramatic feeling. The octopus/cyclops creature definitely draws attention to the storefront, which is empty. There’s a For Rent banner on the window.

For Rent by owner it says. No food.

About the drips, Ravitz says, "…they are an abstract expression of an other worldly entity of an unexpected experience. They have made thousands of people smile."

Indeed.

Some of you may remember that our gold Volvo stationwagon broke down in January on the approach to the George Washington Bridge.

The car suffered engine failure and we were towed from the Palisades Parkway to Summit Avenue in Ft. Lee right across from the Econo Lodge. I called a local car service and we were ferried home. The car service driver gave us the name of a local garage that would tow our car.

In the subsequent days, we had to figure out what to do with our disabled Volvo. Finally, we decided to tow the car to a Ft. Lee garage. But then I got a call from the tower, "The car’s not there."

"What do you mean the cars not there?"

"The cars not there," he said again solemnly.

Seems that the Ft. Lee Police authorized another local towing service to take the car to a local garage. We’d been towed.

Later that day, I went to that garage where they took the car and gave the car to the owner there. It was sad to say adieu to 20-year-old Goldie. We’d had it for ten years. Hepcat loved that car. So did I.

A few days later I received a summons about a court date. A court date? What did we do wrong?

CAR ABANDONMENT I was told when I spoke to someone at Ft. Lee Boro Hall. And according to the summons, I’d already missed my court date—a mandatory court date.

Car abandonment? I almost fell over. Well, the court date was rescheduled for 5 p.m. on March 4th.

Yesterday, a family friend drove me to Ft. Lee and we got to the seemingly empty courthouse at 4:45. We followed signs to the Prosecutor’s Office and found ten people already on the queue—all with 5 p.m. appointments.

At 5 p.m. more than 40 people lined up behind us.

"What time does the courthouse close," I asked a cop trying to gage how long I might be there.

"Until the court is finished. You should be here for about an hour. Tops."

I felt faint. It was hot, the florescent lighting was getting on my nerves, there was nowhere to sit, aggravation about the whole thing, why wasn’t Hepcat with me, agitation, anxiety…

People with lawyers got first priority. That was irksome. I made friends with the couple in front of me, who were summoned for not using a turn signal.

"I think the cop was following us because we were in a 2008 Cadillac," the African-American woman with stunning dreadlocks told me.

Finally I saw the prosecutor. He did a double take when he saw the charge on my paperwork.

"I’ve never seen this before," he said. I began to tell my story. "Well, our car broke down…"

"Your car broke down, that’s not abandonment," he said decisively. "These charges are dismissed. Go into the courtroom and the judge will dismiss these charges."

I said no more. At least there were seats in the courtroom where proceedings moved quickly. When I was called up the judge explained things to me.

"Your car broke down?" he said.

"Yes," I replied.

"All charges are dismissed. But I want to give you a little history. Car abandonment is a very serious charge that carries a $1,000 fine and results in an automatic suspension of your license for one year."

He explained the harsh penalties: years ago there was a national Teamsters strike. The Teamsters were threatening to abandon their trucks on the highway. New Jersey instituted a law that such an action would result in automatic suspension of your license for one year and a $1,000 fine.

That put the kibosh on that. The penalties are still on the books.

"Now you can go through that door, go home and pay no fine," he said.

I said: Thank you.

From Hillary Clinton’s victory speech:

"For everyone here in Ohio and across America who’s ever been counted
out but refused to be knocked out, and for everyone who has stumbled
but stood right back up, and for everyone who works hard and never
gives up, this one is for you."

Last night two local Hillary Clinton supporters, one Obama supporter who said she had guilt feelings about not voting for Clinton in the New York Primary, and I sat in the Santa Fe Grill on Seventh Avenue. From a distance, we saw Clinton on the bar’s television in her bright red suit looking positively radiant. The set was on mute.

"Omigod, she won," one of my friends said. "I’m SO excited."

No one at the almost empty bar seemed to be reacting to the scene in Ohio. I called Hepcat to find out what was going on. He didn’t have the TV on either. I told him to turn it on.

"She definitely won. She wouldn’t be looking that happy if she didn’t win," my friend said.

I reminded them that the Texas primary is tricky. She could win the popular vote but still get less delegates if she didn’t win liberal counties like Austen, at the caucusesI told them.

"But it looks like she won," she said. None of us were wearing our reading glasses so we couldn’t read the informative text on the screen.

"I think she’s going to pick Obama as her running mate," the other Hillary supporter said.

"Really?" I said skeptically.

"Definitely," she said with certainty. "They’ll be an incredibly strong team. If you campaign for Hillary I want to do it with you," she told the other Hillary supporter at the table.

I couldn’t help but feel proud and happy for Hillary. She really managed to pull these primaries out of the bag.

What stamina, what strength, what an ability to bounce back from adversity. It’s pretty impresive if you think about it.

"The pundits were wrong once again," I said as we left the restaurant.

"Yup," someone said as we walked out into the light rain.

The Brooklyn Eagle reports that you’ll be able to strap on your roller skates this summer at Lola Staar’s roller rink in Coney Island. A roller rink near the board walk. That’s sounds like a whole lot of fun. I think it’s going to be very popular.

"Lola Staar entrepreneur Dianna Carlin’s dream of installing a seaside
temporary roller rink didn’t make such ambitious claims, but does
promise to add some pizzazz to a place that’s changed little over the
years besides the occasional clearing of another lot."

This Saturday March 8 (not sure about the time), a “Save Coney Island” event is planned at  Southpaw in
Park Slope, 125 Fifth Ave. between Sterling and St. Johns. This should be quite the shindig:

Burlesque
dancers and hot rodders will be on hand, helping to promote awareness
of the city’s (controversial) plan to convert a portion of Coney Island
into a park, leased to a single amusement operator. Borough President
Marty Markowitz and Coney Island Development Corporation President Lynn
Kelly are expected on the red carpet. Dance party DJs, burlesque
performances and “never-before seen slide shows” await inside.

The Hellgate Harmonie, an adventurous and gutsy local performance group, used its citing as one of the 2007 Park Slope 100, to advertise a coming show at the Brooklyn Lyceum.

Cool.

They will be performing Mascagni’s Cavalleria Rusticana in English at the Brooklyn Lyceum on
March 8, 15, 16, and 22, starting at 3:30pm.

I love the sense of risk that they bring to everything they do:

A great opportunity for kids to experience grand opera up close. 40 piece
orchestra, chorus, great voices, fantastic music and drama.

Not
sure if we’re going to pull this one off – a huge and intense score,
lots of instruments, unfamiliar conductors…should be interesting
(think: NASCAR pile ups, smell of burnt rubber, exploding bassoons)

Check here for details and to order tickets:  http://www.gowanus.com/MORE?listingid=100119

In case you haven’t heard, the Modern Literature Book Club has chosen Ford Madox Ford’s The Good Soldier as it’s next pick.  They’ll be discussing it on Wednesday, March 26th at 7:30 pm. 

The Good Soldier, first published by Ford in 1915, is set just before World War I and chronicles the lives of two seemingly perfect couples.  Using characteristically modernist devices such as   a non-chronological time sequence and an unreliable narrator, Ford’s work set the bar high for the modern novel.  It’s also loosely based on Ford’s own problematic life, so we’ll have some opportunity to gossip aplenty (kidding, of course.)

So pick up your copy at the Community Bookstore today.

Josh, who runs the bookstore had two things to add in a recent email:

The first is that, because of the undeniable success of this book club, the Community Bookstore is looking for ways to expand our book club offerings.  We’ll be sending you an email soon (hopefully) detailing other book clubs that we will offer here.  So that is something to look forward to, for sure.

Secondly, because the turnout was so strong for Dubliners (and I promise in the future we’ll work with the space better in order to fit everyone in better), we left so many things on the table.  I had mentioned the idea of creating an online forum, so that people could continue the conversation even after the meeting ends. More on that to come.

This
Thursday,
March
6th,
the
Park
Slope
Civic
Council
will
present
a
community
forum
on
sustainability
entitled
"PlanPS2008:
How
You
Can
Start
Fighting
Climate
Change
Today."

Featuring
presentations
by
the
Director
of
the
Mayor’s
Office
on
Long-Term
Planning
and
Sustainability,
Rohit
Aggarwala,
solar-power
expert
Anthony
Pereira,
green-roof
guru
Rob
Crauderueff
and
Garbage
Land
author
Elizabeth
Royte.

The
forum
will
be
chock-full
of
everything
from
easy-to-implement,
everyday,
eco-friendly
tips
to
how-tos
on
solar-panel
and
green-roof
installations. 
Expert
panelists
will
provide
you
with
the
know-how
to
start
making
Park
Slope
a
greener
community
today.

Thursday,
March
6th,
2008
7:00
p.m.
–
9:00
p.m.
Old
First
Reformed
Church
7th
Avenue
and
Carroll
Street
Park
Slope,
Brooklyn

The
forum
is
free,
and
free
on-site
child
care
will
be
provided
by
Old
First’s
trained
childcare
staff.

Continue reading How You Can Fight Climate Change: Thursday at Old First →

It’s a burgundy colored, big custom made comfy chair. Admittedly a little dirty, the chair is ever so comfortable and a great place to sit for reading, watching television or napping.

Two very nice OTBKB readers came by this evening. They liked the chair very much but weren’t sure it would fit in their living room. They went home to measure the space where they envision the big red chair. They may or may not be back to pick up the chair.

It could be recovered.

It could be cleaned.

Here are the dimensions: 37 inches deep, 44 inches wide, and 38 inches high.

If you’d like to pick it up at our house — it’s yours.

Why are we giving it away? Because it takes up too much space in our living room and it’s a little dirty. Oh yeah, the springs are coming out of the bottom.

History: my mother had it made at a snazzy upholsterer in Soho. When it was delivered she realized that she’d made a HUGE mistake. The chair took up too much space in her living room. She immediately had it delivered to our apartment.

That was probably 13 years ago. It’s a nice chair. Just not the right chair for us right now.

There should be normal F train service today after a weekend of extensive disruptions to service. Track work, however, will continue during late night service from Mar 4 – 7 and 11 – 14, from 12:01 AM to 5 AM Tue to Fri.

For more information check out the MTA Weekly Service Advisories.

When I was a kid, I saw John Cage perform at Hunter College. For a kid it was a strange. He sat on the stage reading from scraps of paper into a microphone. It was kind of boring but I got that it was important. It was JOHN CAGE. It was avant garde in the early 1970’s. Cool.

This Thursday, Issue Project Room is doing An Evening of Cage:

Issue Project Room at
the
(oa)
can
factory
232
Third
Street
–
Brooklyn,
NY 
11215
www.issueprojectroom.org
Telephone
718-330-031

Thursday
March
6th
An
evening
of
Cage

John
McDonough
and
Kurt
Gottschalk
present
a
night
of
John
Cage’s
music,
in
preparation
for
their
upcoming
CD
of
Cage’s
compositions
for
radio,
to
be
released
in
2009
on
Mode
Recordings.

Indeterminacy
/
Variations
I
(For
two
guitars
and
voice,
using
text
by
Gertrude
Stein.
Performed
by
Twiceband:
Kurt
Gottschalk,
Kristen
Persinos
and
Russell
Scholl)

Cartridge
Music
(For
four
phonograph
needles)

Radio
Music
(For
1
to
8
radios)

Landscape
Under
Construction
(For
between
1
and
45
CD
players
playing
John
Cage
CDs)

.

"Fleeting
Memories," is a web
book by Park Slope poet Michael Ruby with
many
pictures
about
forgetting and
remembering
and
parenting
in
the
period
around
9/11.

It is featured
on
the
website
of
acclaimed
Brooklyn
publisher
Ugly
Duckling
Presse:
http://www.uglyducklingpresse.org/

Here is Michael Ruby from the introduction: "This is a collection of memories that popped into my mind over a period of seven years at work, as a copy editor at The Wall Street Journal, across the street from the World Trade Center. As far as I can tell, the memories came from nowhere, with no relation to the mostly political articles I was editing about the Republican takeover of Congress, the government shutdown, Monica Lewinsky, the Starr Report, the downfall of Newt Gingrich, impeachment, Florida or Bush v. Gore. Many of the memories are glimpses of places, a street corner and nothing more, as if a major function of the mind were this continuous global positioning, this continuous murmuring, ”Right now, I’m at the corner of 10th Ave. and 64th St.” The places are distributed fairly evenly over the course of my life, with a somewhat disturbing precedence given to the streets around my childhood home at 251 Montrose Ave. in South Orange, N.J."

I urge OTBKB readers to take a look at this incredible web
book. It is certainly of
broad
interest
to
the
"Turning
50"
and
parenting
crowds
in
Park
Slope,
as
well
as
to
anyone
who
lived
through
9/11.

Michael Ruby, a poet and journalist who lives in Park Slope, is the author of two poetry books, At an Intersection and Window on the City, and the editor of Washtenaw County Jail and Other Writings by David Herfort. He’s currently working on several new books of poetry: The Mouth of the Bay, based on pre-Socratic propositions; Close Your Eyes, transcriptions of what he sees with his eyes closed; and American Songbook and The Star-Spangled Banner, two related works using lyrics from 20th century American popular songs and the national anthem. He’s also slowly writing a historical memoir about the families of his eight great-grandparents in Eastern European shtetls and the U.S. between 1850 and 1950. A graduate of Harvard College and Brown University’s writing program, he works as a copy editor at The Wall Street Journal and lives with his wife and three daughters in Park Slope.

I see that Gowanus Lounge beat me to the punch but I had to wait to get in touch with the woman who wrote this note on Park Slope Parents before posting it.

She had some rather negative things to say about her experiences at the Atlantic Avenue P.O. I wrote to her this morning and she was happy to share her less-than-happy thoughts with readers of OTBKB.

I’ve read
on
the
PSP list
about
problems
that
residents
have
with
the
Van
Brunt
Post
Office
on
9th
Street
and
the
7th
Avenue. What
about
the
post
office
on
Atlantic
Avenue
and
3rd,
for
those in the
North
Slope,
Clinton
Hill,
Fort
Greene
areas,
etc..? 
Is
there anyone
who
has
a
contact
there
in
management
or
who
would
like
to
help
deal
with
that
branch?

I
have
never
had
a
package
or
letter
that
needed
to
be
signed
for
delivered
by
them! 
I
can
be
at
home,
or
the
nanny
can
be
at
home,
but
they
will
not
ring
the
bell
so
that
you
can
sign
for
and
accept
your
package. 
They
just
put
a
"redeliver"
slip
on
the
mail
box
and
leave. 
Then
when
you
sign
the
redeliver
slip,
they
never
pick
it
back
up
and
never
deliver
your
item! 
I
was
in
an
hour
and
a
half
line
once
again
over
the
holidays,
taking
off
work
to
sign
for
something
that
my
nanny
could
have
signed
for
at
the
time
that
they
first
came. 

I
complained
to
a
female
manager,
and
four
or
five
people
around
me
in
line
were
there
for
the
very
same
reason,
and
they
were
all
home
at
the
time
the
postal
person
first
came! 
The
manager
took
our
information,
but
nothing
has
changed. 
I’m
now
waiting
on
an
item
for
over
two
weeks
that
was
not
delivered,
but
after
ten
days
they
finally
took
the
slip
but
didn’t
deliver
anything,
and
now
I
cannot
even
claim
the
item
because
I
have
no
slip!
And
I
don’t
want
to
take
a
half
of
a
day
off
work
to
deal
with
it. 

An ode to the amateur, Be Kind Rewind, is a joyous treat for those who love to watch creativity in action.

Jack Black, as a nutty neighborhood character and Mos Def, as an employee at a down-at-its heels neighborhood video store, have to make their own versions of movies after all their VHS tapes are demagnetized.

The film gets wild and fun when we see the two of them (plus Melonie Diaz who joins in for the fun) as they remake these films in a completely ingenuous and kooky ways.

Pizza pies become bloody special effects, xeroxes become old cars, aluminum foil works wonders in a multitude of ways.

In many hilarious scenes, the team recreates Ghostbusters, Rush Hour 2, Driving Miss Daisy, When We Were Kings and more.

We loved it.

Cool (blog) celebrity sighting: After the show, we ran into Joe Holmes of Joe’s NYC with his family in the lobby of the Pavilion. They stayed to the very end of the Be Kind Rewind credits. Big cinema buffs that they are, they loved the film.

I saw the promise.

At the Seventh Avenue Starbucks, it’s a handwritten chalk board sign with every employee’s signature on it.

I wasn’t wearing my glasses so I asked one of the baristas to read it to me. It says something like: we promise to make a perfect cup of coffee and if we don’t please tell us and we’ll make it again.

I asked the barista if it turned out that she’d been making the coffee all wrong. She said she’d been doing it right but that the training at the store hadn’t always been consistent. Some people were doing it right and others were doing it wrong.

She told me that the training would be standardized now and all employees would be employing the correct method for frothier foam and perfect coffee drinks.

Talk about frothy. The "tall" latte she made me had exceptionally frothy cream .And the coffee tastes strong.

All good.

PS I am an occasional Starbucks customer. I spread my coffee drinking around. Due to budgetary concerns, I tend to buy mine at Grand Canyon or the newsstand. Cheap trumps cappuccino these days.

Walking up to the F Train for the first time in a long time, I noticed that the construction wood around the old D’Agostino space is bright red.

Hint. Hint.

What bank has a bright red logo? Hmmmmm.

It’s Bank of America, kids. Bank of America.

They’re putting new doors on the former Tempo Presto space on the corner of Third Street and Seventh Avenue.

I wonder if this is the restaurant/cafe a PR guy called me about a few weeks ago. "He said he was inquiring, for his client, about advertising on OTBKB. 

All hush and hush and secretive, he ouldn’t tell me the name of the place. Top secret and all that. I said if you want to keep it a secret don’t tell me because I’m Only the Blog Knows Brooklyn and it’s my job to Know and tell all (unless it’s off the record and I can keep secrets).

Anywho, two Russian guys were doing construction work in the new restaurant. It looked like they took the bathroom out. They wouldn’t say what kind of restaurant it is.

"We don’t know," they said.

I wanted to say, you have to tell me I’m OTBKB. But I didn’t. 

Dr. Gordon just sent me this alert from the Department of Health:

Dear HAN Subscriber:

We have just released a DOHMH Alert
concerning Measles in Brooklyn. It is available on the HAN home page ,
is appended to this email, and is also attached as a pdf file. To read
the attachment, you will need the Adobe reader. If you do not have that
software, it can be downloaded at no cost at
http://www.adobe.com/products/acrobat/readstep2.html.

To log into the HAN, for this alert and many related documents, go to www.nyc.gov/health/nycmed

If you have any questions or problems, call 1-888-NYCMED9 or write to  nycmed@health.nyc.gov

February 25, 2008

2008 DOHMH HEALTH ALERT # 5: Measles in Brooklyn

1)
Two measles cases have been identified in a family in Brooklyn. The
cases have not travelled outside of New York, indicating exposure to
measles within the City.
2) All clinically suspect cases of measles
(febrile illness accompanied by generalized maculopapular rash) must be
reported immediately (prior to laboratory confirmation) to the New York
City Department of Health and Mental Hygiene at (212) 676-2292 or 2313
(weekdays 9 am to 5 pm). For after hours and weekends, please call
Poison Control 212-764-7667. Suspect cases of measles must be placed in
respiratory isolation immediately.
3) Appropriate clinical specimens should be sent to the NYC DOHMH Public Health Laboratories for testing.

Please
Distribute to All Primary Care Staff, Including Infectious Disease,
Emergency Medicine, Internal Medicine, Pediatrics, Family Medicine, and
Laboratory Medicine and All Infection Control Personnel

Continue reading DEPARTMENT OF HEALTH RELEASES MEASLES IN BROOKLYN ALERT →

My mother-in-law is in town and we’ve been playing Scrabble as we love to do. About mid-way through a game on Tuesday night, I used used the word LUCIFER on a triple word score.

My mother-in-law and Hepcat challenged me. "That’s a proper noun. You can’t use that," my mother-in-law said. We looked in  the dictionary and it was capitalized.

"Seeeeeee," Hepcat cried self-righteously.  "You can’t use that. It’s capitalized. That means it’s a proper noun."

Hepcat victorious.

But then I looked in the Scrabble Dictionary and it said that lucifer is a friction match.

A friction match. Nice. I got 36 points in one turn. Nice.

On Tuesday, Starbucks closed all of its 7100 American stores today for three hours for barista re-training. I walked by Park Slope’s Starbucks on Seventh Avenue near First Street and saw the staff sitting in the back of the store being re-trained or whatever it is that they were doing.

I felt like waving at those familiar faces. Like, hey guys. You okay in there?

Howard Schultz, Starbucks CEO, pulled a Steve Jobs by reclaiming his job as CEO in January in an attempt revitalize the company.

He says he wants baristas to feel the passion for making espresso—it’s all part of a new focus on the  customer experience.

Racked had this conjecture about the real reason for company-wide shuttering.

NATIONAL—Rumor has it that the Starbucks shutterings
tonight from 5:30 to 8:30pm are taking place so that the coffee chain
can switch its wifi over from T-Mobile to AT&T. Of course, the
official word from the company is that they’re retraining all their
baristas. If so, that coffee should taste extra-special tomorrow
morning. [RackedWire Inbox]

Pix by Owen

Every day I receive numerous e-mail digests from the Park Slope Parents list-serve in my  in-box and even though I don’t have babies anymore, I always make it my business to see what’s going on.

Sometimes I am moved to answer a question. In the last few days someone asked others to share their c-section experiences and I was considering jotting mine down. Most of the time I just read. Recently someone wanted to know where to buy make-up and I put in my two cents about MYR. My sister frequently comments on matters pertaining to adoption.

A few weeks ago when my stepmother was in the hospital, I asked about local services that prepare and deliver food for sick people. I
got plenty of responses that were very helpful and illuminating.

PSP has 10,000 subscribers. Every day dozens of people exchange information about  parenting and related topics. It’s hard to remember Park Slope without it. Sure, it’s easy to parody and make fun of and, indeed, the media has had great fun at its expense.

But it is a private conversation about personal and public matters. And what a fantastic resource it is for those who use it. That’s why it’s important that members (and that means anyone with kids) feel comfortable and safe about the information exchange.

And yet…it’s the Internet, anyone can read it, and there’s no stopping anyone from taking the information and doing what they wish with it.

PSP operates on a honor code of sorts. What plays in Vegas, stays in Vegas. There are rules of the PSP game and it’s important that people respect them.

For those who participate, it is the virtual Seventh Avenue, a great place to spread the word about urgent matters like a rash of muggings on 8th Avenue, a restaurant closing or a new policy at a local bar.

Yesterday someone wanted to know humane ways of getting rid of a mouse. Admittedly, I am a particular fan of the posts about rodents and other pests.

Today’s roster on the listserve includes: Tell me about your c-section, alternatives to Ikea, 
recommendation
for
tree
pit guards, and a request for info on the Brooklyn New School.

Park Slope Parents also has a public website that is community
built
and
commercially
supported. While the listserve is limited to parents and those who sign up, the website is open to everyone. From the organizers of PSP, here’s a guide to how
you
can
help
keep
Park
Slope
Parents
a
valuable
resource
for
area
parents:

—-
Send
a
Summary
 
If
you
ask
a
question
on
the
list
and
get
great
responses,
please
post
a
summary
to
the
list
and
also
send
it
to
summaries@parkslopeparents.com

—-
Post
a
Review
Take
2
minutes,
log
into
the
website
and
post
a
review
(good
or
not
so
good)
about
anything
from
a
local
store,
home
improvement
specialist,
OB-GYN
or
daycare.

—-
Tell
people
“I
found
you
on
the
Park
Slope
Parents
website”
or
“I
saw
your
ad
on
the
PSP
Website”
If
you
call
or
meet
someone
from
the
PSP
website,
please
let
them
know
you
heard
about
them
on
the
Park
Slope
Parents
website.

—-
Promote
YOUR
business
(or
tell
other
people
to
promote
theirs)
 
We
have
advertising
opportunities
on
the
website
and
since
you
can
now
post
Commercial
Posts
(for
a
fee)
to
the
website,
promote
your
business
while
supporting
PSP.

—-Be
A
Guest
Writer
(you
don’t
have
to
be
a
professional
writer)
 
If
you’ve
researched
an
area
of
parenting
that
would
be
of
help
to
other
folks,
ease
their
load
and
save
them
time
and
effort,
by
writing
up
an
article
for
the
website.
Contact
feedback@parkslopeparents.com
to
let
us
know
you
want
to
help.

—-Be
A
Guest
Editor
 
See
some
typos
that
are
driving
you
nuts? 
Be
a
guest
editor
and
help
us
clean
up
the
site! 
Contact
feedback@parkslopeparents.com
to
let
us
know
you
want
to
help.

I ran into a friend,  a former Third Street neighbor, at the armory ceremony on Tuesday. She wanted to speak to Councilmember Bill De Blasio about the new parking meters on Seventh Avenue on 10th Street and above.

So we did.

When we left the building, said friend told me about a book called Tepper Isn’t Going Out by New Yorker writer, Calvin Trillin, about parking. Said friend has the same last name as the book’s protagonist.

Trillin’s book is the oh-so-New York story about a man who sits in his car reading the newspaper. Why? Because he has a great parking space. Here’s the blurb from the Random House website.

Murray Tepper would say that he is an ordinary New Yorker who is simply
trying to read the newspaper in peace. But he reads while sitting
behind the wheel of his parked car, and his car always seems to be in a
particularly desirable parking spot. Not surprisingly, he is regularly
interrupted by drivers who want to know if he is going out.

Tepper
isn’t going out. Why not? His explanations tend to be rather
literal—the indisputable fact, for instance, that he has twenty minutes
left on the meter.

But once New Yorkers become aware of Tepper,
some of them begin to suspect that he knows something they don’t. And
an ever-increasing number of them are willing to line up for the
opportunity to sit in his car with him and find out what it is.

Councilman Di Blasio knows that parking is probably one of the single most aggravating aspects of city life. Coming between a New Yorker and a parking space spells trouble. That’s why Bill says the DOT got it all wrong when they installed over 60 parking meters on Seventh Avenue without telling anyone.

Surprise.

Bill knows which way his bread is buttered. And he has to park his car, too. He asked the DOT to stop use of those parking meters and have a community meeting. Bill believes in the process. As he told me: "You talk to merchants, you talk to residents. you have a community meeting." 

That’s how it’s done.

Said friend with the same name as Trillin’s hero told Bill: "Thanks for advocating for us, Bill."

And she meant it. 

I saw this play when I was in junior high and never forgot it. Written by Aristophanes, Lysistrata, is an antiwar—and feminist—classic.

LYSISTRATA, a bawdy and audacious antiwar classic, is filled to the brim with hilarious innuendo and exposes the shared humanity between two feuding peoples. The women of the warring factions wage a psychological battle of their own when they take over the Acropolis and withhold their sexual favors from the savage local men until such time as the insane conflict is ended.

Lysistrata opens March 15 and runs through March 30, 2008 (12 performances only). Performances take place Thursdays, Fridays, and Saturdays at 8PM; Sundays at 3PM. Additionally, The Gallery Players is offering a Saturday matinee performance at 2PM on March 22nd and March 29th only.

Tickets are $18 for Adults, $14 for Senior Citizens and children 12 and under. Tickets can be purchased 24/7 online at www.galleryplayers.com or by calling TheaterMania at (212) 352-3101 (phone hours 9-9 weekdays, 10-6 weekends).

The Gallery Players is located at 199 14th St. , between 4th and 5th Aves. in Park Slope, Brooklyn . Take the F Train to 4th Ave. or the R Train to 9th Street . By car: BQE to Hamilton Avenue to 14th Street.

Director Cynthia Wade and Producer Vanessa Roth made Park Slope
proud on Sunday night when they won the Oscar for Freeheld, their short documentary.

Both women live with their families in Park Slope and have production companies here, too. Roth’s company, Big Year Productions, was established in 1994 to produce social issue documentaries and outreach programs that "challenge systems and promote progressive social change."

Interestingly, Roth is at work on a feature documentary about teachers with author and 826nyc  and McSweeney’s founder, Dave Eggers.

Their Oscar-winning film, Freeheld, is the story of Laurel, a female detective, who spent 25 years investigating
tough cases in New Jersey protecting the rights of
victims and putting her life on the line. She had no reason to expect
that in the last year of her life, after she was diagnosed with
terminal cancer, that her final battle for justice would be for the
woman she loved.

This film documents her struggle to transfer her earned pension to her domestic partner, Stacie Andree.  With less than six months to live, Laurel refuses to back down when her
elected officials – the Ocean County Freeholders -deny her request to
leave her pension to Stacie, an automatic option for heterosexual
married couples.

At the armory  ribbon cutting ceremony, a buoyant Bill De Blasio spoke with me and a 10th Street resident about the 64 new parking meters on Seventh Avenue above 10th Street.

"I was walking on Seventh Avenue one day and I saw the meters and I said, What the…?" De Blasio told me. Clearly he knew nothing about it in advance.

So, the Department of Transportation installed 64 parking meters on Seventh Avenue without warning neighborhood residents—and politicians.

"And there was no process," De Blasio said. "There has to be a process. You talk to residents, you talk to merchants. You have a community meeting."

He talked about the process that went into the rejection of the proposal to turn Seventh and Sixth Avenues as one-way streets and the community’s input into the successful plan to put a bike lane on 9th Street.

In this case, the DOT just surprised the neighborhood with absolutely no warning. Like no one was going to notice. Come on, parking is everyone’s hot button issue. Car owners spend way too much  time parking their cars not to notice. Adding 64 meters to Seventh Avenue spaces that were previously Tuesday/Thursday spaces. Not good.

"They did everything wrong," De Blasio said about the DOT. "It was wrong all around.

For now, he has formally asked the DOT to discontinue use of the meters and has asked them to organize a neighborhood meeting.